Intelligence | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

Two Russian-born Australian citizens have been arrested and charged in the country for spying on behalf of Russia as part of a "complex" law enforcement operation codenamed BURGAZADA . This includes a 40-year-old woman, an Australian Defence Force (ADF) Army Private, and her husband, a 62-year-old self-employed laborer. Media reports have identified them as Kira Korolev and Igor Korolev, respectively, noting that they had been in Australia for over a decade. The married couple were arrested at their home in the Brisbane suburb of Everton Park on July 11, 2024, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) said in a statement. They have been charged with one count each of preparing for an espionage offense, which carries a maximum penalty of 15 years' imprisonment. "It is the first time an espionage offense has been laid in Australia since new laws were introduced by the Commonwealth in 2018," the AFP said . The federal law enforcement agency has alleged the pair ...

The United States Department of Justice has announced criminal charges and sanctions against 9 Iranians involved in hacking universities, tech companies, and government organisations worldwide to steal scientific research resources and academic papers. According to the FBI officials, the individuals are connected to the Mabna Institute , an Iran-based company created in 2013 whose members were allegedly hired by the Iranian government for gathering intelligence. Though the content of the papers is not yet known, investigators believe it might have helped Iranian scientists to develop nuclear weapons. In past four years, the state-sponsored hacking group has allegedly infiltrated more than 320 universities in 22 countries—144 of which were in the United States—and stolen over 30 terabytes of academic data and intellectual property. The group used spear-phishing attacks to target more than 100,000 e-mail accounts and computer systems of the professors around the world, and suc...

Vulnerability Management (VM) has long been a cornerstone of organizational cybersecurity. Nearly as old as the discipline of cybersecurity itself, it aims to help organizations identify and address potential security issues before they become serious problems. Yet, in recent years, the limitations of this approach have become increasingly evident.  At its core, Vulnerability Management processes remain essential for identifying and addressing weaknesses. But as time marches on and attack avenues evolve, this approach is beginning to show its age. In a recent report, How to Grow Vulnerability Management into Exposure Management (Gartner, How to Grow Vulnerability Management Into Exposure Management, 8 November 2024, Mitchell Schneider Et Al.), we believe Gartner® addresses this point precisely and demonstrates how organizations can – and must – shift from a vulnerability-centric strategy to a broader Exposure Management (EM) framework. We feel it's more than a worthwhile read an...

What's the coolest part of the Iron Man movies? The hyper-intelligent Artificial Intelligence that helps Tony Stark by doing data analysis, charging his armor, presenting information at crucial times and doing other business operations. That's right — we are talking about J.A.R.V.I.S. , Iron Man's personal assistant. We all dream of having one of its kinds, and even Facebook's Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has ambitions to live more like Iron Man's superhero Tony Stark. While disclosing his 2016 resolution via a Facebook post on Sunday, Zuckerberg revealed that he is planning to build his own Artificial Intelligence to help him run his home and assist him at office — similar to Iron Man's digital butler Edwin Jarvis . "You can think of it kind of like Jarvis in Iron Man," Zuckerberg wrote in his Facebook post . "I'll start teaching it to understand my voice to control everything in our home — music, lights, tempe...

National Security Agency (NSA) – the one that had ruled over the privacy of the entire world from countries to individuals, the one with master access to read anyone's data, intruded into large fiber networks, and can target anyone, at any time, at any place; but lapsed somewhere in protecting its own privacy and security of the confidential data. If I am wrong, then from where did Snowden gets hold over roughly 1.7 million NSA's confidential files in sequence? According to the Intelligence officials who has investigated the insider theft by Snowden, noticed that he had accessed all these documents using some ' web crawler ', a freely available automated tool also known as spiders, which used to search, index and backup a website, " scraped data out of our systems " he said. " We do not believe this was an individual sitting at a machine and downloading this much material in sequence ," he added. He used the web crawler tool against NSA 's internal network and 'probably...

Edward Snowden , a former contractor at America's National Security Agency (NSA) , has rocked the intelligence world by leaking secret documents which reveal the previously unknown extent of global spying. But looks like the NSA isn't the only one using dirty digital tricks to hack its targets. Back in September, it was reported that the UK's equivalent of the NSA, GCHQ had hacked Belgacom , a leading telecommunications provider in Belgium. Some New analysis of the Snowden papers by German magazine Der Spiegel shows that British intelligence agency GCHQ created fake LinkedIn and Slashdot pages to spy on computers of  Belgacom  network engineers. Communications networks are particularly valuable to spies, because they allow instant access to individual users. Belgacom provides internet access to dozens of key EU institutions based in its capital city Brussels and its global roaming exchange is a hub for connections between various international mobile netwo...

The Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) , a pro-regime hacker group that emerged during Syrian anti-government protests in 2011, and involved in cyber attacks against western media organizations are now in the FBI's wanted list. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has issued an alert warning of cyber attacks by the Syrian Electronic Army and finally put them on its radar. " The SEA'S primary capabilities include spear-phishing, web defacements, and hijacking social media accounts to spread propaganda. " they said. The FBI also has increased its surveillance of Syrians living in the US. According to some anti-Assad activists, the group was founded by former intelligence agents and hardcore Assad supporters. SEA had compromised social media profiles for Western news organizations by sending fake email messages to news staff in an attempt to gain access to login credentials. Most recently, the group grabbed international attention after commandeering the webs...

The secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) gave the green light to the Obama administration by r enewing the government's authority Friday to continue the collection of millions of Americans' telephone records. The order by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has been in place for years but must be renewed every three months and this month it was  expired on July 19.  The Obama administration maintains Congress shouldn't be surprised by the programs. NSA surveillance programs were  exposed in the month of June,  by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden .  He has been charged with espionage and remains in diplomatic limbo at the Moscow airport after seeking temporary asylum. President Barack Obama says the government is not listening in on calls, and  Intelligence officials say they have helped disrupt dozens of terrorist attacks, and target only foreign suspects outside the United Stat...

The US Department of Defense has cleared Apple's iPhone and iPad for use on its military networks, along with the Samsung Galaxy S4 and BlackBerry 10 devices, the agency said in a statement Friday. The entire DOD is much, much larger, of course, and mobile devices are increasing in importance for the military just as much as they are for we civilians. The report notes that out of more than 600,000 mobile devices used by the Defense Department, only about 41,000 of those are Apple products, with most of those not connected directly to the military's networks. But because these platforms have previously not been certified or cleared for use, such devices had not been connected to secure military networks, except for testing. The move was hardly shocking, but Samsung devices running the Knox security suite and BlackBerry 10 already trickling into the hands of Pentagon employees, the decision sets the stage for a three-way bout for military market supremacy. Offic...

The hacktivist group Anonymous says it's planning to block all live streams of President Obama's State of the Union address Tuesday night, in an operation entitled " Operation SOTU ". " We reject the State of the Union. We reject the authority of the President to sign arbitrary orders and bring irresponsible and damaging controls to the Internet, " the statement reads. " The President of the United States of America, and the Joint Session of Congress will face an Army tonight. " Anonymous group is upset with a pending Internet security bill. According to Anonymous and other Internet freedom activists, if the CISPA (Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Information Act) is passed it will infringe on online privacy and freedom. A Twitter account associated with Anonymous also hinted by tweeting ," ADVANCED WARNING: This year's State of the Union Address WILL be cancelled if internet regulation is passed by executive order #opLastResort " ...

India is set to take steps to protect its cyber infrastructure and designate agencies for carrying out offensive cyber attacks on other countries. Indian Government announce the appointment of   first coordinator for The National cyber security agency. Mr. Gulshan Rai , who presently heads the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN), will be the first coordinator. The move comes at a time when proof shows countries launching cyber attacks not only for intelligence gathering and many nations describing the attacks as an act of war. " The plan is in final stages with certain legal issues being clarified. Among the issues are some objections to the legal powers of the proposed National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIPC), a command-and-control centre for monitoring the critical infrastructure. NCIPC is to be managed by the technical intelligence agency NTRO (National Technical Research Organisation), and...